Wonder Bread was originally produced by the Taggart Baking
Company of
Indianapolis, Indiana and debuted on May 21,
1921, after a blind promotion with ads that only stated a "Wonder" was coming on
May 21, 1921. When it was launched, the new brand was named by vice president
for merchandising development Elmer Cline, who was inspired by the International
Balloon Race at the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Cline was filled
with "wonder" by the scene of hundreds of balloons creating a kaleidoscope of
color resulting in the iconic red, yellow and blue balloons featured on the
Wonder Bread logo.[4]
The logo was designed by commercial artist Drew Miller while he was on staff at
a Chicago ad agency.

VINTAGE ADVERTISEMENT

Taggart was purchased by
Continental Baking in 1925. This made Wonder
Bread a national brand and added "It's Slo Baked" to the logo. In the 1930s,
Continental Baking began shipping Wonder Bread in
sliced form, one of the first companies to do
so and a significant milestone for the industry and for American consumers, who,
at first, needed reassurance that "wonder-cut" bread would not dry out.[4]
Unsliced bread returned for a while during
World War II due to a steel shortage that led
to an industry-wide slicing suspension in 1943. Bread slicers returned two years
later.[4]

During the 1940s, Continental Baking began adding vitamins and
minerals to Wonder Bread as part of a government-sponsored program of
enriching white bread which was notoriously
deficient in vitamin and mineral content, to combat certain diseases. Known as
the "Quiet Miracle", this development is credited with greatly reducing the
incidence of the diseases
beriberi and
pellagra. Wonder was also the first national
bread brand to feature open-dating as well as nutrition information on its
packaging.[4]
In the 1950s, Wonder Bread further expanded advertising of its nutrient
enrichments. The company sponsored
Howdy Doody with host
Buffalo Bob Smith telling the audience, "Wonder
Bread builds strong bodies 8 ways. Look for the red, yellow and blue balloons
printed on the wrapper." By the 1960s, Wonder Bread was advertised with the
slogan "Helps build strong bodies 12 ways," referring to the number of
added nutrients. In 1986, the lower-calorie
Wonder Light bread was introduced.

The Hostess CupCake was
first sold on May 11, 1919.[1][2][3][4]
According to author Andrew F. Smith, it was the first commercially produced
cupcake, originally produced by the Taggart Bakery as the Chocolate Cup Cake.[2]
Hostess has also claimed that it was "the first snack cake ever introduced to
the market."[5]
In 2004, rival
Tastykake disputed this claim, claiming that
Tastykake introduced the first snack cake.[5]

Originally, two cupcakes were sold for five
cents.[4]
Different flavors were offered during the early years, including cupcakes topped
with vanilla or
malted milk flavored icing.[3]
During the 1940s, an
orange flavored cupcake was developed, with
orange cake and icing.[3]
But until 1950, the Hostess CupCake did not have any filling or the white
squiggly line across the top.[3][6]

In 1947, D.R. "Doc" Rice, who started his career at Hostess in
1938 with a job that entailed dumping baked cakes on a table, was given the task
of developing the Hostess CupCake further.[3]
These developments culminated in an updated cupcake in 1950.[6]
A white line consisting of seven squiggles was added to the top in order to
distinguish the Hostess CupCake from other brands.[3][6][7]
The vanilla creme filling was also added.[3][6][7]
Rice got the idea for using a creme filling when a new machine for injecting
filling into Hostess
Twinkies became available.[3]
Improvements were also made to the cake mix and the chocolate icing in 1950.[3]
According to Rice, the updated cupcakes were first produced and
test marketed in
Detroit.[1]

Other flavors of Hostess cupcake that have been available at
times have been a golden vanilla and strawberry.[6]

In 1988, 400 million Hostess Cupcakes were sold.[1]
As of 2011 Hostess sells over 600 million CupCakes each year.[7]
Although Hostess Brands entered into
bankruptcy protection in 2012, the company
plans to continue making CupCakes and other snack cakes such as
Twinkies and
Sno Balls.[8]

Twinkies were invented in
Schiller Park, Illinois in 1930 by
James Alexander Dewar, a baker for the
Continental Baking Company.[2]
Realizing that several machines used to make cream-filled strawberry
shortcake sat idle when
strawberries were out of season, Dewar
conceived a snack cake filled with
banana cream, which he dubbed the Twinkie.[3]
He said he came up with the name when he saw a billboard in St. Louis for
"Twinkle Toe Shoes".[4]
During World War II, bananas were rationed and the
company was forced to switch to
vanilla cream. This change proved popular, and
banana-cream Twinkies were not widely re-introduced. The original flavor was
occasionally found in limited-time promotions, but the company used vanilla
cream for most Twinkies.[5]
In 1988, Fruit and Cream Twinkies were introduced with a strawberry filling
swirled into the cream. However, the product was soon dropped.[6]
Vanilla's dominance over banana flavoring would be challenged in 2005, following
a month-long promotion of the movie King Kong. Hostess saw its Twinkie
sales rise 20 percent during the promotion, and in 2007 permanently restored the
banana-cream Twinkie to its snack lineup.[7]

In January 2012, Twinkie manufacturer Hostess filed for
Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.[4]
Twinkie sales for the year ended December 25, 2011 were 36 million packages,
down almost 2% from a year earlier.[4]
Hostess said customers have migrated to healthier foods.[4]
In November 2012, Hostess announced that is was ceasing production of all its
products and liquidating all assets, but it hopes to be able to sell its more
popular brands to other manufacturers